The Art of Being Uncertain

There is a unique quality of light that exists in the short times between the dark of night and the brilliance of day. You cannot see everything clearly, but little remains hidden by the shadows. The same uncertainty exists during the times of the most upheaval throughout modern history. In the time between the great wars, when things looked dark and yet the brightness of hope and renewal shone out, some of the most productive cultural movements came to life.

The Surge of Expression in Uncertain Times

In Weimar Berlin, Germany particularly, you can see this in the surge of art styles, theater expression, and distinct architecture. The Bloomsbury Group, a casual collection of writers, artists, and creative thinkers, explored new types of relationship with aesthetics. They set aside Edwardian rigidity and adopted ideas inspired by philosopher G.E. Moore, which included the concept that duty, religious rules, and tradition were not the most important or best things a person could do.

Besides giving the world some of the most appreciated names like Virginia Woolf, E.M. Forster, and artist Roger Fry. Woolf helped the world first see character-driven fiction with internal focus. Fry helped new art enthusiasts enjoy post-impressionism and other styles in a more accessible way. The group and its influence on culture also opened minds to the possibility of less rigid social norms and relations, including those with non-traditional household structures and open relationships.

A quintessential example of the creativity of the post-WWI era was the Bauhaus, which was founded by architect Walter Gropius. Prior to this time period, there were distinct divisions between fine art, craft, and building design. Creators and thinkers stayed in their own lanes. The Bauhaus brought them together and encouraged them to collaborate and visualize beyond their own specialty. With sculptors, painters, weavers, architects, typographers, and more all working together, they created not just another new aesthetic, but an entirely new way to approach the process of creation.

Uncertainty provided a fertile breeding ground for innovation, exploration, and new types of thinking. The same was reflected in new music. The period, dubbed the Jazz Age, rang with the sounds of rediscovery and reimagining freedom and identity. Sparked to life in Black American communities by such names as Duke Ellington and Louis Armstrong, this new sound combined influences from diverse places and changed the way people danced and celebrated life. The feeling echoed in literary works from Zora Neale Hurston and Langston Hughes and painters like Aaron Douglas and Archibald Motley.

The in-between times did not end when WWII began, and they didn’t peter out in the wake of advancing modern life. The world is constantly full of uncertainty that sends us oscillating across the line between dark and light. Minds change. Old institutions lose authority. People adopt new ways of thinking, acting, and believing. One of the most important things to note about the above-mentioned people and experiences: None of them waited until they knew for sure what the outcome of their actions would be. It’s impossible to wait for certainty in uncertain times. We’d be waiting forever and nothing would ever change.

The Power of Uncertainty Manifested

Why did this edge of historical darkness and light produce such a cultural and behavioral shift in Europe and around the world?

There are two things a person can do when faced with doubt and upheaval. They can remain stagnant, hang on to old norms and ways, and simply try to weather the storm. Or they can stand up in the face of it and find ways to both embrace the unique experience and build something that challenges the uncertainty itself.

Many people see uncertainty as something to fix as quickly as possible. They don’t want to rock the boat because that involves risk. History shows us that this is not usually the best path. The moment between dark and light when storms of doubt are raging, gives us a unique opportunity to do something equally as wild and uncertain: create with genuine depth of purpose and meaning. Instead of surface aesthetics, we can imbue creation with substance.

How Can Creation Spring from Uncertainty Today?

As intriguing as the idea and the exploration of great changes between the wars is, the concept alone does little without defining the mechanism behind it all. In many ways, new ways of thinking and acting are forced into the light because the structure of the old world was destroyed. It’s much more dramatic when that takes the form of bombed buildings and complete cultural collapse. It might present more problems when the change is more insidious and easily hidden by the distractions of modern life.

When the familiar and functional structures of life fall away or rot from the inside out, we’re forced to start asking questions and explore new types of answers. Artists, investors, architects, and everyday people alike begin to operate with more open-mindedness than before. Intention shifts from survival to renewal. Depth becomes an advantage of everything from marketing messages to how a single person chooses to spend their free time.

Much of the future lies hidden in the shadows of uncertainty these days. Doubts, questions, and fear can overwhelm and encourage stagnation. We might default to holding on to what used to work and trying to ride things out. The problem is that doing that will not work any better than it did in the time between the world wars.

The creative minds of the past did not welcome in the light of a new dawn by accident. As what worked in the past disappeared, it left behind space and an unfettered view of what could be. What truly matters? What can we rebuild? What deserves to be completely reimagined and renewed? These are the same questions we should ask ourselves today to leave behind old ways of thinking that contributed to the world’s degenerative drift in the first place. The answers we find rely on substance rather than superficiality and depth instead of despair.